Computer monitors are an often underestimated part of the computing experience. Geeks who don’t flinch at spending $500 on a tablet or $1,000 on a computer will often buy a monitor based exclusively on price.

That’s a shame, because the monitor influences everything you do on your PC. It can make games more impressive, movies sharper and documents clearer. The plethora of monitors on the market can make finding the right one hard, so let’s see if we can arm you with the right information.

Resolution Is A Double-Edged Sword

Display resolution is often used as a selling point for a monitor. The higher, the better. It is true that a high resolution will result in a sharper image, but you need to know about some potential downsides as well.

One problem is the perceived size of text and icons. If you increase the resolution of a display without increasing its physical size, everything on that display will appear smaller. For many people this is not an issue, but users with poor eyesight may have problems with a display that features a high resolution and a small display size. The most common example on the market today is a 21” monitor with 1080P resolution. Some people will find text on a monitor such as this to be too small to read.

Gaming also can conflict with a high display resolution. Modern LCD monitors work best when displaying content at their native resolution, but if your graphics card isn’t powerful, you may have to turn a game’s resolution below the monitor’s native resolution. This will usually result in a slightly blurred image – still playable, but far from ideal.

1080p is incredibly common, but if you have poor eyesight or are concerned about your GPU’s performance, consider a monitor with a resolution of 1440×900 or 1680×1050 instead.

You Can’t Judge Image Quality In A Store

I was recently reminded of this when I bought a monitor at Best Buy. It was meant to be a simple replacement monitor for a gaming system, and it looked decent enough on the shelf.

When I took it home and placed it next to the older monitor, however, I was surprised to find that the new monitor had difficulty with dark images. I also noticed that the backlight was uneven. I could see more brightness leaking into the display from certain portions of the bottom edge, and this bothered me. I had to take the monitor back to the store.

This only reinforced a basic lesson that applies to not only monitors but also HDTVs, laptops, tablets and virtually any other device with a display. Stores are unusual places, with lighting that is much brighter than a normal home environment and plenty of distractions. You can’t trust your eyes.

What should you trust? Reviews. Sites like Anandtech, CNET, and TFT Central can provide excellent information. User reviews aren’t a terrible source, either – they can at least steer you away from products with obvious problems.

The Details Matter

There is more to a display than the panel. For example, cheap monitors often come with inexpensive plastic stands that easily wobble and sway and don’t offer ergonomic adjustments. Expensive monitors usually come with tilt, pivot and high adjustments as standard.

Don’t neglect connectivity. Two models might look identical, but if you turn them around, you’ll find that one offers only a single input and the other offers four. You will also run into monitors that offer a built-in USB hub, which can be useful if you are connecting to a mini-PC or a laptop.

A Monitor Is A Long Term Relationship

While most areas of consumer technology have advanced at lightning speed over the last ten years, monitors have made only small leaps. A good monitor built 5 years ago is still a decent monitor today.

Monitors tend to be reliable, as well. If you’d like proof, just go visit a business with an insufficient IT budget. They’ll still be using a fleet of monitors that’s nearly ten years old.

This means that you should buy a monitor under the assumption that you will be keeping it for some time. Cheap monitors are appealing, but they also lack input options and have so-so image quality. When spending your money, consider the value that you are receiving for your dollar. Do you really want to be staring at a sub-par display for five years?

If you use your computer for gaming, productivity or multimedia, I recommend that you purchase a quality monitor even if you have to spend twice as much. An extra $100 or $200 spread over five years is peanuts.

The Bottom Line

As you might have noticed, I have a bit of a bias in favor of the more expensive monitors on the market. When I took back the inexpensive monitor I purchased at Best Buy, I picked up a Dell Ultrasharp 2412M online to replace it. I had to pay just over twice as much, but in exchange I received superior image quality, an excellent display stand, more connectivity options and a three-year warranty. In retrospect, I was foolish to even consider the cheaper option, as the value it offers is significantly less.

Don’t buy based on price and don’t buy based on your own subjective impression on the store floor. Read reviews, evaluate your needs and pay attention to details like the warranty and connectivity. Don’t be afraid to buy a monitor without viewing it in person if all the reviews are excellent. Most retailers will let you return a monitor within 15 or 30 days without a restocking fee, so if you strike out, trying again only costs you more time.

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Dav532000

March 13, 2012 at 8:57 pm

I am still using my Samsung 19" SyncMaster and I am quite happy with it. I have been looking at the 24" Dell IPS Monitor but it will have to drop a bit more price wise befoe I consider buying it. Agree with some others only some basic info here and not much to help someone make a choice if they were looking to upgrade.

I just got done reviewing for myself the same size monitors, the best out there right now are the Dell Ultra Monitors, some may think they are pricey, but they have Great Video display quality & resolution & 16:10 aspect ratio, and you can rotate them to portrait mode also, better warranties also. Also they are VESA mountable - some monitors you can't mount them. They come in 24, 27 & 30 in. models. The 27 and 30 in. are super sweet, especially the 30 in model. 2nd best choice is HP. I spent about 8 hours poring over all of the info, and checking reviews.

As long as the monitor has the minimum resolution I need it to have for the task it will be used for and has the necessary connections, price is high on the list of consideration.

I've had expensive "major name brand" monitors that cost a hefty sum that barely made it more than a year - what a waste. Right now, I'm typing this note on a 19" I-INC LED that is awesome - which I picked up on sale for only $69!

If I were heavy into gaming or did photo retouching as a profession, I might be inclined to go the expensive route - might be - but for everyday use.... Price rules!

Personally.... no matter who made the monitor, I've learned to buy the extended warranty.

You are correct there in that a 19" monitor would most likely not be good for most but I did note that it depends on the task it's used for. In my particular case, this 19er is used for emails and referencing documentation while I do my work on the 23" widescreen. It's all up to individual preference. I guess that the point that I was wanting to make was that bigger and/or pricier isn't always a better choice for the particular task at hand. I also use 3 of these inexpensive 19" models for my workbench. If one gets broken or fried - no major loss. I don't need a 23" monitor to run backups, or troubleshoot a PC issue - unless, of course, the issue is video related.

In art 100.... form follows function. This $69, 19" 'tool' does what I need it to do and then some. For me it works!